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Vanessa’s Law – ‘Protecting Canadians from Unsafe Drugs’ (Bill C-17)

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on December 8, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. Leave a comment
From Leonie’s Blog:

7 Dec

Terence youngTerence Young is a Canadian MP whose 15 year old daughter, Vanessa, died from a heart attack due to the heartburn medication Cisapride, marketed as Propulsid.

A month after Vanessa’s death the FDA released a statement stating that Propulsid was being pulled off the market due to the associated risk of serious cardiac arrhythmias and death; here. An Article by ‘Thomas L. Perry’ stated that Vanessa’s father was dumbfounded to read this Los Angeles Times exposé showing that the FDA and the manufacturer had known since 1993, 7 years before Vanessa’s death, that Prepulsid caused cardiac arrhythmias.

Yesterday (6th Dec 2013), the Canadian Minister for Health Rona Ambrose announced that the Canadian government is introducing new patient safety legislation, Vanessa’s Law, providing for the protection of its citizens from unsafe drugs.Vanessa Young Minister Ambrose stated “Today, we have introduced Vanessa’s Law, a law that would protect Canadians and help ensure that no drug that is unsafe is left on store shelves.” The proposed new legislation, if enacted, will enable the Canadian Government to sanction the pharmaceutical industry for selling unsafe products, proposing fines of up to $5 million per day and even imprisonment. It further provides that the Government can compel drug companies to do further testing, to revise their labels and recall dangerous drugs.

Terence Young stated “It is difficult to overstate the impact this bill will have for Canadians who take prescription and over the counter drugs. It represents a quantum leap forward in protecting vulnerable patients and reducing serious adverse drug reactions. It is absolutely necessary to reduce deaths and injuries caused by adverse drug reactions, seventy percent of which are preventable, and will serve Canadians extremely well.”

It remains to be seen whether this bill will be enacted. If so, the Canadian Government will be the first to put their citizens before the very powerful multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical industry. Either way, I foresee strong resistance to this bill, but maybe, just maybe, this is the first major bruise on Pharma’s Achilles’ heel.

In contrast to the latter, the UK Government recently debated the suicide link associated with Roche’s ‘Roaccutane’. Again, two parents had waited 10 years to get this debate to Westminster, this time on the Roaccutane-induced ‘suicide’ of their son following a few short weeks on Roche’s notorious acne drug. Roche pulled this drug off the US market in 2009, but it’s still available in the UK and Ireland. It has been stated that Roaccutane may have caused up to 20,000 deaths. The Westminster talk can be viewed here: approx 16.27 Mins. Caroline Nokes MP looked, to all intents and purposes, like she was sucking a Roaccutane-soaked lemon. I can only hope that the promise to keep talking to these parents was well-intentioned and not just Minister’s puff.

So, the Canadian and UK Government are at least discussing prescription drug induced deaths. The Irish Government are not!

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SO, YOU WANT A LOBOTOMY?

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on October 19, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. Tagged: Adderal, adhd, bipolar, risperdal, ritalin, seroquel, seroxat, zyprexa. 2 Comments

You can DO IT YOURSELF!  Yes, a D.I.Y. Lobotomy.

See, I’m a big proponent of D.I.Y.  Have executed countless D.I.Y. projects myself,  shared many functional  D.I.Y. tips on my Pinterest and Facebook accounts.  I haven’t necessarily tried all of them, but I find that the ones that require no special skill, are not crazy expensive and ALWAYS get the expected result should be shared and this D.I.Y. fits all that criteria and then some.    This is one of your easier D.I.Y.’s.

http-inlinethumb64.webshots.com-43135-2429175020105101600S600x600Q85NO NASTY ICEPICKS!

With a little bit of research (under one hour)  you will find all the information about all the drugs that you require, but a little bit of advice from this self proclaimed D.I.Y. Diva –  I would  stay away from ‘accredited websites’ such as  Health Canada or the FDA – they tend to never get it right. They must suppress or ignore (I really don’t know what the hell they’re doing with) actual reports from real people.  This is a nightmare for D.I.Y.ers.   You need to get the data from people who have actually taken (or are on) these drugs to get the real skinny.   Google “I feel like a Zombie” or something like that.  See what happens.

Depending on how fast you want this to come about, you may want to double or triple up on the drugs you have chosen.  That’s the beauty of D.I.Y.  eh? YOU control this as it’s  totally dependent on your choice of drug(s)  and how long you want to spend getting there.

No hospital stay or even visit, required.  Easier than ever to achieve. No expensive specialists needed – you don’t even have to waste your time and (in the U.S.) money on a psychiatrist!   Your family doctor will help!   Just tell him what you want and he’ll write the prescription(s).   It’s a D.I.Y.’ers duhreeeeaaaam!

No more ice-pick hangover!   No more nasty scars or burn tissue to deal with!  No more niggling fears  that too much tissue will be severed  (thus instantaneously rendering you a complete vegetable)!  Nope, it’s a ‘steady as she goes’ process and best of all, you won’t even realize it’s happening!!!

Good luck to you.  Let me know how it goes.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

EmpathicTherapy_DVDcover“These drugs impair the brain specifically by blocking the transmission to the frontal lobes of the brain…..When you give one of these drugs (Risperdal, Seroquel, Zyprexa etc.) you reduce the personhood with these drugs, even more profoundly than with the stimulant drugs (Ritalin, Adderall, Dexedrine etc.)”.

“You disable their brains.  It’s a chemical lobotomy and that’s NOT a metaphor – that’s a fact”.

Dr. Peter Breggin

A documentary by Kevin P. Miller.  Crucial data for parents.

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Risperdal – A Canadian Story

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on September 29, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. Tagged: class action lawsuit. 41 Comments

Canada doesn’t appear to be as litigious as the U.S. and you don’t hear much about successful cases brought up against the Pharma giants here but I’m really hoping that this is going to change in Canada….and fast.

And it’s not that I want to see litigants become suddenly wealthy either.  It’s because I want the Pharmaceutical companies to stop marketing and selling drugs that are maiming and killing people – our children in particular.

It’s been my experience that the ONLY way stop a Pharmaceutical company from doing this is to hit them where it hurts, where it costs them some money because, you see, ethics have long gone.  Responsibility is non-existent and it is unfortunately the only thing that will do it.

It’s not enough for them to pull drugs off the market on account of these drugs have killed or caused kids to kill.   Kids like Toran Henry from New Zealand (suicided while on Prozac) or Shane Clancey from Ireland (stabbed a boy then turned the knife on himself while on Celexa) or Brennan McCartney from Canada (suicided while on Cipralex) and thousands more.

So there’s hope here.  Hope in the form of a Mr. Joseph M. Prodor, a lawyer in British Columbia who is working on a class action lawsuit* against Johnson & Johnson, makers of Risperdal.

Risperdal is an anti-psychotic and has been prescribed (off label) to boys who subsequently grew breasts due to one of the drugs side effects – elevated levels of female hormones (prolactin) .   Some of these kids have to have their breasts surgically removed.

Risperdal has  been approved for  children for the following:

Schizophrenia- Treatment of schizophrenia in adolescents aged 13-17

Bipolar Disorder- Short term-treatment of acute manic or mixed episodes associated with Bipolar I Disorder in children and adolescents aged 10-17

Autistic Disorder- Treatment of irritability associated with autistic disorder in children and adolescents aged 5-16

Here is a clip regarding a lawsuit in the U.S.  Notice how J & J caved (and settled) the lawsuit as soon as their CEO, Alex Gorsky was next to get on the stand.  Wonder why?

Mr. Joseph M. Prodor a Lawyer in British Columbia, Canada, is currently collecting information from Canadians who have been affected by this medication and is going to be taking it to the courts to get it certified as a class action lawsuit.

OFF-LABEL PRESCRIBING
While Risperdal has only been approved for the above uses in children, doctors are able to prescribe it for various other unapproved or “off-label uses” such as:ADHD
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
Anxiety disorders
Eating disorders
Tourette syndrome
Disruptive behavior disorders in children
Depression
While it may be legal, the practice of off-label prescribing puts children at risk for serious, life-threatening side-effects without concrete proof/evidence of benefit.

RISPERDAL SIDE-EFFECTS
Rapid weight gain
Hypertension
Diabetes
Breast cancer
Tumors of the pituitary gland
Gynecomastia (breast development in males)
Galactorrhea (lactation)
Hyperprolactinemia
Decreased bone mineral density
Osteoporosis
Metabolic syndrome
Involuntary movement disorders (tics, twitches, muscle contractions)
Nueroleptic malignant syndrome (NMS)

For anyone in Canada wishing to join this lawsuit, please contact:

Joseph M. Prodor, Esq. (trial lawyer)
15260 Thrift Avenue
White Rock, BC V4B 2L2

Tel: 604-536-4676
Fax: 604-535-8981
Toll Free Tel: 1-877-JPRODOR (1-877-577-6367)
jprodor@axionet.com

He will be able to take your info and direct you to someone in your province or give you instructions.

*A class action lawsuit is filed on behalf of a group of people who have been in some way injured by the actions of a company.

When someone joins a class action lawsuit, he usually has to sign papers declaring that he then forfeits the right to sue the company as an individual. A successful suit awards damages to the plaintiffs, who are those suing the company, according to greatest damage. In most cases, not all members of the suit are entitled to equal compensation.

Usually, the attorneys work on a contingency basis, which means that they will receive a portion of the award but charge their clients no fees if the suit is not successful. That portion can be high, ranging from 30% to 50% of the total award.

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Health Canada Doesn’t Help

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on September 10, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. Leave a comment

This needed to be re-posted.  Here you go.

By: Jesse McLean Investigative News reporter, David Bruser News Reporter

Health Canada brushes off reports of serious side effects

Doctors and loved ones thought their side-effect reports would alarm Health Canada and send its investigators digging for more information. They would be disappointed.

Brennan McCartney, 18, killed himself four days after starting Cipralex, an antidepressant. His mother, Nancy McCartney, filed a side-effect report to Health Canada and heard nothing. “There was absolutely no acknowledgement that anybody has read this, let alone investigated,” she said.

Brennan McCartney, 18, killed himself four days after starting Cipralex, an antidepressant. His mother, Nancy McCartney, filed a side-effect report to Health Canada and heard nothing. “There was absolutely no acknowledgement that anybody has read this, let alone investigated,” she said.

A Bolton teen hanged himself from a tree four days after he started taking Cipralex, an antidepressant. His mother went online and filed a side-effect report to Health Canada.

A pediatrician, troubled by the spate of side effects he was seeing in kids taking a generic version of an ADHD medication, faxed 25 reports to Health Canada over two months.

After a 49-year-old York Region man killed himself while taking smoking-cessation drug Champix, his sister called in a side-effect report to Health Canada.

All three say their reports were ignored.

The Star has found Health Canada is not investigating individual reports of serious side effects.

While the regulator periodically reviews the often-scant information in some reports, the Star’s research shows it is not digging deeper to learn about troubling cases. We found no evidence that Health Canada, after receiving these reports, is doing any formal case investigations that would help the regulator better monitor drug safety.

The mother’s report “went into cyberspace” without a response. The sister received an impersonal form-letter thanking her for making the report about her dead brother. The doctor, who expected his faxed reports to alarm Health Canada and send its investigators digging for more information, would be disappointed.

“I thought alarm bells would have been going off given that I said somebody died,” said Nancy McCartney, whose 18-year-old son Brennan killed himself while on Cipralex. “There was absolutely no acknowledgement that anybody has read this, let alone investigated.”

A serious report involves patients who either went to hospital, suffered a disability or life-threatening condition, or died.

McCartney wrote in her report to Health Canada: “(Brennan) was provided with a sample package (of) Cipralex … He did not have a diagnosis of depression. He took one tablet a day on Nov. 5, 6, 7 and 8. He completed suicide on November 8, 2010, and was found 24 hours later. He had no history of mental health issues … went to the doctor for a chest cold and came home with an SSRI (antidepressant).”

McCartney told the Star: “Why aren’t people alarmed by this? I haven’t heard from anyone at Health Canada.”

As part of the Star’s ongoing investigation  into drug side-effects, recent articles have also revealed:

• Nearly 600 cases of Canadian kids suffering serious, sometimes fatal side effects suspected to have been caused by ADHD medications since 2001.

The Star had found patients and health-care professionals were not told of this disturbing trend because Health Canada, which collects these adverse reaction reports, had not analyzed the data.

• 24 Canadians taking Champix  to quit smoking have killed themselves since it hit the market here in 2007, putting it among the leading suspected causes of reported suicides linked to prescription drugs.

Health Canada and the drug companies said the side-effect reports show only a suspected connection between a drug and side effect but no medical proof that one caused the other. (A report is the opinion of the doctor, pharmacist, patient or parent that a drug is suspected to have caused a side effect.)

Then, after the Star’s ADHD drug story was published Sept. 26, Health Canada posted a general statement on its website that said: “(Side effect) reports are analyzed to confirm or rule out a cause-and-effect relationship and to discover potential safety concerns.”

The side-effect database contains about 100,000 serious side-effect reports made since 2001. They have been pouring into the database from across the country, with nearly 20,000 last year, about double the amount filed in 2008.

The Star has repeatedly asked Health Canada if it has investigated individual reports of suspected side effects. Has Health Canada followed up with those who make the reports — whether a doctor, pharmacist or mother — to learn more about the case? Has the regulator tried to access medical records or conducted interviews with doctors and patients or their family members?

Health Canada will not answer.

The Star also asked about the specific cases detailed in this article. Again, Health Canada did not answer.

“We have reported adverse events and there hasn’t been feedback or anything,” said Dr. Sohail Khattak, a behavioural pediatrician and ADHD specialist. “No letters. No calls.”

Another ADHD doctor, Kenny Handelman of Oakville, said he has on occasion filed adverse reaction reports that were met with silence.

“I just want to know that if red flags are being raised that Health Canada is going to do something to protect us,” Handelman said.

In a Sept. 26 letter to the Star, Health Canada’s Dr. Chris Turner, director of the regulator’s marketed health products directorate said:

“Health Canada has highly trained specialists who use Canadian adverse reaction data as well as other sources of information to systematically monitor, analyze and act on safety issues. Sources of data include post-market studies, company data, published data, international safety data and collaboration with international counterparts.”

Doctors Khattak, Handelman and other ADHD specialists are concerned that a generic version of ADHD drug Concerta is not releasing the medication into a patient’s bloodstream at the same rate as the brand-name version. They believe this difference in the pill’s time-release mechanism is leading to side effects.

The drug, Teva-Methylphenidate ER-C, came on the market in early 2010. Almost immediately, side-effect reports started piling up in Health Canada’s database.

The Star found 229 Teva-Methylphenidate ER-C reports — 32 of them serious — were made by the end of that summer.

Dr. Khattak filed five reports on Aug. 6, 2010.

He did the paperwork because he thought Health Canada would pay attention and the reports would make a difference. One of the reports said a 7-year-old boy on Teva-Methylphenidate ER-C thought about killing himself.

“If there is a cluster of symptoms that are being reported, some action should have been taken, right?” Dr. Khattak said. “At least someone should do a follow-up . . . assign a couple of investigators who can go to get more information. We have not heard anything.”

Since the spring of 2010, there have been 318 Teva-Methylphenidate ER-C side-effect reports, 66 of them serious.

A Teva spokesperson said that when patients or doctors report first to the company instead of Health Canada, and the information is incomplete, “we contact the original filer of the report to obtain as much information as possible. Once sufficient information is in hand to allow for a proper medical assessment, one of Teva’s medically qualified reviewers performs a full medical assessment.”

Reports first made to a drug company must be forwarded to Health Canada.

Asked if Health Canada has investigated side-effect reports relating to its generic drug, Teva said it is “not aware of specific investigations Health Canada may conduct — nor are we aware of such investigations conducted by other regulators in the world such as the U.S. FDA (Food and Drug Administration) or the EMA (European Medicines Agency).”

The response Lynn O’Neil received from Health Canada after she reported her brother’s suicide made her angry.

O’Neil’s brother, Bob Toderian, who lived near Keswick and worked in Oakville, committed suicide on Dec. 29, 2010. He had been taking Champix to quit smoking for about three weeks. She called Health Canada to report his death after she learned the coroner didn’t bother to.

The drug regulator responded with a boilerplate letter thanking O’Neil for submitting a report and informed her of the nine-digit number assigned to her brother’s case.

Health Canada’s letter misspelled O’Neil’s name and her brother’s initials. The drug regulator also enclosed a blank adverse-reaction reporting form for her “future use.”

“I was pretty disgusted. They’re not even enough on the ball to have the correct initials for my brother?” said O’Neil.

She wrote the drug regulator a five-page letter. She wanted Health Canada to know what kind of person her brother was, and how he had changed in the week leading up to his suicide.

“Bob was not someone that was depressed prior to taking Champix,” she wrote. “I would think that a suicide while on such a controversial drug would be considered very serious and I am amazed that no one from the Canada Vigilance Department would contact me.”

Pfizer Canada would not comment on Toderian’s death, but a spokeswoman said the company “believes that any death is a tragic situation for families and loved ones who are personally impacted.”

“Pfizer believes that there is no reliable scientific evidence to demonstrate that Champix causes serious neuropsychiatric events. The health and safety of Canadians is a priority for Pfizer, and we work closely with Health Canada to disseminate information about our products to patients and the medical community,” Pfizer spokeswoman Christina Antoniou said.

In Health Canada’s response to O’Neil, it apologized for the typos and assured her that the regulator “does recognize the severity of your case report and that it was handled as such internally.”

“The fact that you have not been contacted does not testify of the priority assigned to your report,” a Health Canada representative wrote.

No one from Health Canada has contacted O’Neil since.

“They didn’t investigate his case. They assigned a number to it, and that was it. Nobody ever phoned me back, nobody ever phoned his doctor,” O’Neil said.

“They just made a note of it and put it in a file somewhere. That was the end of it.”

Investigating side-effect reports would at least help ensure the information in the Health Canada database is accurate, said Nancy McCartney.

After her son Brennan’s death, his doctor filed an adverse reaction report to Lundbeck Canada, the maker of Cipralex, who then forwarded it to Health Canada. This report and the one Brennan’s mother made are in the Health Canada database. There is one key difference between the two.

The report filed by the doctor via the drug company says Brennan was also on Biaxin, prescribed for a chest cold.

“The coroner came to the house and sat us down at the kitchen table and one of the things he pulled out was the prescription for Biaxin. He had taken it from Brennan’s wallet to ask us about it. (Brennan) hadn’t filled the prescription.”

Had Health Canada investigated and followed up with the McCartney family, this “inaccurate” detail would have been taken out of the database, she said.

“It shouldn’t have been listed on the report. What the drug company is saying is Cipralex is suspected but Biaxin may have contributed (to the death). That is inaccurate information. Just by putting that in there, they’re taking the focus away from Cipralex and muddying the water.

“I don’t get a sense that anybody looks at this data. I don’t get a sense that anybody cares.”

The Star made two attempts to reach Lundbeck, maker of Cipralex, and got no response.


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NUMB – FOR MOTHER’S DAY

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on May 13, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. Tagged: abilify, adhd, anti-depressants, child psychiatry, Daytrana, drugging children, health, health canada, learning disorder, mental health, mental health advocates, mental health services, Mother, Mothers Day, Parenting, paxil, prozac, Psychiatry, ritalin, school children, seroxat. 2 Comments

Happy Mothers Day to Y’all!!

What would I wish for on Mothers Day?  Let’s see…. world peace?  Yep.  No more starving children would be right up there.  Both good choices but I’ll let the other activists do their thing in those areas and I’ll just tackle something a little closer to home.  A little more in my own backyard so to speak.   What I wish for Mothers Day is for all Mums/Moms to watch this video – NUMB, THE DOCUMENTARY.  Yep.  That would make me one happy Mum.

It would make me one happy Mum because it might get you to question.  It might make you take a really good look at how what you once thought was an innocuous little pill prescribed by a very learned doctor, may not be all it was cracked up to be.

It’s an honest, poignant story about a man trying to get off Paxil (Seroxat) who starts to question his own sanity while doing so.  For those of us who have either been through a withdrawal and/or have done our homework and are familiar with the fact that withdrawal from these drugs can produce a worsening condition (worse than the condition you originally started taking the medication for) this will come as no surprise.  However for the unsuspecting number of people, whom I believe to be in the majority, this film will be a real eye-opener….and that’s a good thing.

Even though he is an informed man, he still questions himself as to whether it’s the drug withdrawal (euphemistically classified  “discontinuation syndrome” by the pharmaceutical industry) or  the ‘illness’ coming back.  Which leads me to the reason why I would like all Mothers to watch this film.

If  a mature, sensible  and articulate man is having trouble controlling his emotions coming off this drug, how on earth would a child react?   A little soul in an undeveloped body – impulsive and inarticulate at the best of times?  What is this drug doing to his body/mind in the meantime?  I think it would be more like hell on earth.

This is a short clip from the documentary:

You can either rent or buy the documentary HERE. 

Please do your homework before putting your child on a prescribed medication.  Drugs such as:

Celexa, Lexapro, Luvox, Prozac, Ritalin, Prozac, Xanax, Anafranil, Elavil, Norpramin, Pamelor, Sinequan, Surmontil,  Parnate, Nardil, Marplan, Cymbalta, Effexor, Remeron, Wellbutrin, Desyrel, Vyvanse, Daytrana, Quillivant, Norpramin,  Adderall, Concerta, Dexedrine, Focalin, Metadate, Methylin, ,Tofranil, Catapres, Duraclon, Kapvay, Nexiclon, Tenex, Strattera, Intuniv, Kapvay, Abilify……..to name a few.

Look at the side effects.  Here are informative sites that I know of:

nIcTfX

KDlVEt

Psychiatric medication can be dangerous.  You owe it to them to watch this documentary and for what it’s worth …….you’d make me one really happy Mum today.

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FINDING THE MEANING IN SUFFERING – LAURA DELANO

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on April 24, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. 1 Comment

This young lady’s story/journey is so inspiring. I recall a few years ago, waiting for her to write another chapter about her life so I could see how she was doing. She communicates extremely well with no holds barred.

I am so happy for her that she made it, some people don’t. That she has devoted a large part of her life to helping others is a testament to not only her understanding of life, but her fearless and indomitable spirit.

She gives hope.

You can read her entire journey here.

Finding the Meaning in Suffering: My Experience with Coming off Psychiatric Drugs (in a Nutshell)

Laura Delano

April 23, 2013

For the last month or so, Mad in America has been hard at work building a directory of “mental health” providers across North America (and eventually, we hope, the world) who will work with people wanting to come off psychotropic drugs.  So far, we’ve connected with traditional doctors, osteopaths, naturopaths, psychologists, social workers, counselors, and alternative/holistic practitioners and healers who do this work in varying ways — some have prescribing capacities and some don’t; some do the actual tapering, while others provide psychotherapy; some offer nutritional or supplemental support; others, Reiki and acupuncture.

I’ve been honored to have been tasked with the responsibility of building this directory, and I have to say, it’s been inspiring to talk to people all over the country who do this work, and who “get it”.  Closer to the launch date, which we anticipate will be in the next few weeks, I’ll write up more about this project, and thank those who’ve played such a significant part in making it happen.  In the meantime, I’ve been itching to write a bit about my own “coming off” journey.  While it’s on my mind every day, I’ve been thinking more about it recently, given my work on the directory and the recent release of Daniel Mackler’s new film, “Coming off Psych Drugs: A Meeting of the Minds”.  I woke up this morning and my fingers were itching.  I knew it was time to write.

In September 2010, I came off the last of my “med regimen”— lithium, Lamictal, Abilify, Effexor, Ativan, and a PRN of Seroquel— and I said goodbye to a life of orange pill bottles and phone calls to CVS pharmacy, of dosage increases and new scripts to be filled, of the floral pill bag that shook like a maraca, and of the complete and total dependency on inanimate chemical capsules to define what I felt, how I thought, and who I was.  After over ten years on psychotropic drugs, it had been an agonizing five months of tapering— I realize today that my psychopharmacologist likely had no idea what he was doing— and I would continue on for the next year and a half in the midst of daily physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual pain [for more on this, see my Madness Radio interview].  In the midst of this suffering, however, I was able to put my head on the pillow at night knowing that these pills were out of me.  Gone, never to enter my bloodstream again.  A decade of daily psychotropic drugs had circulated through my veins, seeping into my organs, my brain, my hair, my skin, my nails.  A decade of daily psychotropic drugs had successfully disconnected me from a sense of self, physical health, emotional balance, and social connectedness.  A decade of daily psychotropic drugs had nearly succeeded in killing the last scraps of my human spirit, and me, along with it.

On that brisk fall day over two and a half years ago, against the wishes of my “treaters”, and in the midst of hell on earth, I reclaimed myself.  My Self.  By no means has a second of it been easy, but it’s certainly been the best decision I’ve ever made in my life.

As time’s gone on, particularly in the second and third years of my post-psychiatry life, I have slowly but surely healed from the trauma of my psychiatric “treatment”.  It’s been a long road, fraught with physical pain, unparalleled emotional upheaval, gut-wrenching anxiety, and paralyzing fear.  In the midst of my worst moments— whether it was the hours upon hours spent lying frozen in fetal position on the sofa, staring blankly at the wall, disconnected from the world; or wondering if I’d ever be able to hold down a job, a relationship, or even the daily task of showering and changing out of sweats; or looking at healthy people functioning in the world around me and feeling baffled by how the hell they could possibly be doing it; or wanting to rip my skin off from the debilitating anxiety, and shut my head down to silence the endless chatter; or crying when I didn’t want to cry, and laughing when I didn’t want to laugh; or feeling like the only alien on planet Earth— I clung on to the one and only reason why I’d started my journey off of psychiatric drugs in the first place, my life preserver, keeping me afloat: I was determined to find myself, the Self I’d lost as a fourteen-year old to a “Bipolar” label, and a life sentence of polypharmacy.  This spark of fire, however small it might have been in the beginning, outweighed all the pain, and allowed me to keep trudging forward.  I was absolutely, 100% determined to find myself, no matter what the cost.

As a person who’s found liberation from psychiatry, I have learned that the least fruitful path to follow— for me, at least— is one of self-victimization.  I served a long sentence that began early in my life and came with the shackles of numerous psychiatric labels and at least nineteen psychotropic drugs.  I could say that I had my life taken away from me by Psychiatry, but I simply don’t believe that anymore, for only in finding peace with that chapter of my life’s story, and acceptance of all the suffering, the isolation, the hopelessness, the desperation, the self-sabotage, the self-destruction and the nine years of daily thoughts of suicide, can I say that I’m truly free.   I decided about a year into my post-psychiatry life that continuing to think of myself as a victim would mean keeping myself dependent on Psychiatry, locking myself up behind its bars as an emotional slave.  I turned my deep-seated resentment and rage at Psychiatry into passionate and productively channeled anger, and suddenly, I took off, shooting forward into a new life that continues to unfold in truly amazing ways now that I’m no longer held back by those toxic emotions, and, of course, the toxic psychotropic drugs.

As I’ve written before, and however backwards it might sound, today, I am grateful to those doctors, even to the first psychiatrist who threw me on Depakote and Prozac as a young teenager.  I’m grateful to the locked wards and the internalized oppression and the security-blanket dependency on my “meds” and their numbing and disconnecting effects, because all of it has allowed me to become who I am today: a thirty-year old woman with a life ahead of her, who feels the full spectrum of human feelings and an authentic sense of self and purpose.  Had I never found Anatomy of an Epidemic, had I never felt that tiny spark of fire in my belly that told me to take my life back and stand up against my seven-person “treatment team” when they disagreed with my desire to come off psych drugs, and had I never been determined with every ounce of my being to move through all the pain that came along with it, not only would I not have this exciting life ahead of me, but I wouldn’t be alive at all.  I know this to be true.

I do not pretend to have expertise on the topic of coming off psychiatric drugs.  Nor do I believe there is one right way to successfully do it.  What I lay claim to is my own experience, my own lessons learned from constructive choices and destructive ones, and from the intuition I’ve only recently begun to tap into since healing from the trauma of “treatment”.  What never ceases to amaze me is how vast the experiences are when it comes to coming off psych drugs— I’ve heard stories about successful cold turkey withdrawal with no symptoms, and ones about unsuccessful slow tapers.  I’ve heard stories of those who’ve successfully come off in months, and others who did it in years.  I’ve heard of people who found tremendous benefit from supplements, and others who never took a single dose of one and succeeded anyways.  I know some people who’ve thrived from strict nutritional protocols, and others who couldn’t care less about cutting out certain foods.  Exercise, no exercise.  Yoga, no yoga.  Meditation, no meditation.  I know people who were on psych drugs for many, many years, and have successfully come off, and others who went on for a year or less, and struggle tremendously with the withdrawal.  There is simply no one way to come off psychiatric drugs, and no one withdrawal trajectory.

While I certainly agree that the thousands of anecdotal stories out there suggest that a person’s odds of success are increased greatly by slowly tapering off, that doesn’t mean it’s the only way.  It wasn’t, for me.  I came off of five psychotropic drugs in five months; many would say that this is much too fast of a taper, or even not a taper at all.  A wise woman, active in the Psychiatric Survivor movement, once shared with me that tapering off psych drugs very quickly, or stopping them cold turkey, is like Russian roulette— you just don’t know what’s next in the chamber.  Maybe I would have experienced withdrawal for a shorter amount of time, or with lesser intensity, had my doctor brought me off in a year instead of five months.  Maybe had I been ten years older, I would have struggled more.  All I can say is that my journey went the way it did, and here I am today.  I know what’s worked for me, but what’s worked for me might not work for someone else.  No one told me to do all these things; I simply tested it all out, often times accidentally, and bumbled around until I found my path.  I established my own threshold for pain; what I can bear, someone else can’t, and vice versa.  I’ve heard many say that when it comes to the world of self-help, it’s important to “take what you want, and leave the rest.”  That’s been a helpful motto for me to live by, especially as it relates to the topic of coming off psych drugs.

There are many of us out there who work incredibly hard to support people who are coming off of psychotropic drugs.  Among us are psychiatric survivors, medical doctors, psychologists, social workers, counselors, holistic/alternative practitioners, and family members.  You can find us in coffee shops, online forums, facilities, clinics, private offices, via Skype, on the phone, or holding banners at protests and yelling in the megaphone.  Each of us brings a particular nugget of wisdom, inherently subjective, and not for everyone.  There are books, articles, forums, chat rooms, websites, and presentations devoted to the topic of psychiatric drugs and how to come off of them.  Each is simply one way to do it.

When I began the process of tapering off of psychotropic drugs, I had none of these resources.  Sure, I had that huge “treatment team” who met about me on a regular basis and worked hard to ensure I relied on them to “manage” my life, but other than one social worker, a wonderful man whom I’ll never forget and always be grateful to, I felt zero emotional support from the “mental health” system as I came off.  In fact, from looking at my medical records at that time, it appears that my psychotherapist didn’t even realize that my psychopharmacologist was managing my taper, because she reported that I was “non-compliant” and came off my “meds” against medical advice.  But I digress…  My psychopharmacologist had agreed to bring me off four of the five psychiatric drugs (not Lamictal, which he claimed had been proven effective for “Borderline personality disorder” and thus I needed to stay on it), and this was only because the “team” had decided I’d been “misdiagnosed” Bipolar and really, was just an alcoholic and a Borderline!  How interesting!  I met with that doctor once a month as he decreased the four drugs, and I came off the fifth on my own, without having read a single paragraph on how to taper off.  Never once did I connect with a provider about the pain I was going through; I used my psychopharmacologist to taper me off, and nothing more.  This was my experience: not right, not wrong, just mine.  There are certainly providers out there— many of whom will be in our directory— who practice in entirely different, humanistic ways, and who are true supports for people coming off.  I just simply never crossed paths with one during my time in the “mental health” system.

The bulk of my support came from family, and from the sober community I was very active in at the time.  Having a space in which I could express my pain every day, and listen to others do the same, even if their pain wasn’t necessarily connected to psychiatric drug withdrawal, was incredibly beneficial to me, and I believe I wouldn’t have made it through without that support.  In part, I bumbled through the first six months or so believing that the excruciating pain I felt was “early sobriety” from alcohol; I had no idea until many months in that it was less my body healing from alcohol and more my body’s desperate attempt to heal itself from all those years of damaging psychotropic drugs.  At the end of the day, though, that community worked for me because while the drug was different, the emotional pain was the same.  I was also lucky enough to be living with extended family, to have no job (other than being a professional patient, a career I became quite good at!), and to not have the worries of rent, children, or paying the bills.  In short, I was incredibly lucky, and incredibly privileged, to be so taken care of.  I look back on this today and feel gratitude from the bottom of my heart.

While I was able to withdraw in large part because of the reasons mentioned above— unconditional love, a de-stressed environment, and a space of mutual support, among many things— in truth, my success was not because of how quickly or slowly I tapered, the order in which I came off the drugs, my nutrition (or lack thereof), my exercise (or lack thereof), my sleep (or lack thereof), or the people from whom I sought support.  There was something much deeper I had to search for first, something I couldn’t find in an office or on the internet or in a textbook or in a church basement or in the words or wisdom of another person.  For me, what helped me successfully come off of over a decade of polypharmacy was the Why.  Why do I want to come off psychiatric drugs?  What did it mean to me?  What was it that I was searching for?  After I connected to this deep sense of meaning in the “coming off” process, those factors mentioned above— in other words, the How of the withdrawal—carried me through, and brought me slowly back to health.  Discovering why I wanted to come off psych drugs was like putting the key in my ignition and turning it on; the method and the means by which I did it the steering wheel, accelerator, and brake.  Had I not found that key, the process would have been mindless and empty, only about tapering, measuring, calculating, adjusting, so on and so forth.  Likely, I wouldn’t have been able to continue, had that been the case.  When I really connected to the Why of it, I could face the suffering that followed.  As I say often to others, in my experience of coming off psychotropic drugs, the only way out was through.

While I’m really just scratching the surface here with all I could say about my experience of coming off psychiatric drugs, I’ll leave you with what I believe, in my experience, are the key components to a successful withdrawal.  You can take what you want, and leave the rest:

  1. While it’s important to be well-informed about psychiatric drug withdrawal, too much knowledge— and too much fear— can create a self-fulfilling prophecy.  I bumbled through my withdrawal with little to no knowledge of what was ahead, and I actually believe that this helped me tremendously.  I didn’t obsessively read up on withdrawal and fill myself with fear about all the horrible things that could happen to me, and thus, I didn’t set myself up for defeat.  I think there’s a fine balance here between knowing too little, and too much, and it’s a line that each person has to decide for him/herself.
  2. There are no universal experts on psychiatric drug withdrawal, because each person’s journey is so different.  While it can be really informative and helpful to learn from others who’ve been through this process before you, and there are people out there doing very good and determined work to bring people off psych drugs, you are the only expert on yourself and your experience of the world.
  3. The mind plays tricks on you.  On a regular basis, my mind wanted me to give up, to wave the white flag of surrender.  In those moments, I reconnected myself to my sense of purpose— to that determination to find out who I was off of psych drugs— and I did my best to coexist with my thoughts, anxiety, and fear without letting them take me over.  It was in times like these that I did my best to reach out to a friend or family member for support.
  4. Take the time to understand how your body is impacted by nutrition.  I was never a believer in the power of nutrition, and this has been a profoundly beneficial discovery for me.  Cutting gluten out of my diet, however hard it initially was, has done wonders for my mind and body; cutting out processed sugars and processed foods in general, except for the occasional splurge of course, has proven just as helpful.
  5. Remove whatever stressors you have control over, to create as de-stressed an environment as possible.  For me, this meant staying free from “illicit” drugs and alcohol, from unhealthy or traumatizing relationships, and from responsibilities that I wasn’t required to take on.  My body was (and often times still is) incredibly sensitive to the environment I’m in, and thus, managing whatever I did have control over was important for me.
  6. Listen to your body, however hard that may be.   Psych drugs disconnected me from my body and desensitized me in so many ways, so this was certainly a difficult process for me.  I know today that my body is always communicating with me, if I just take the time to feel what it’s saying.
  7. Surround yourself with unconditional support, whether that means family, friends, providers, healers, or some other type of supportive community.  I’ve learned that no matter how isolating or painful the journey may be, you never have to be alone.
  8. When you’re losing hope in yourself, and feeling yourself sinking in the quicksand of withdrawal, place your faith for the time being in those who’ve walked the path before you.  There were so many times when I wondered if I could keep going, when any faith left in myself was so pushed down that I could no longer feel it.  On those days, I thought about others who’d walked the same path before me, feeling the same pain and the same fear, and who were no longer mired in the suffering anymore.  Faith in them was my way of having faith in myself.
  9. More than anything, connect to the meaning behind why you are coming off psychiatric drugs.  This is the seed from which everything grew for me— both the thorns and the blossoming buds.

I could keep going, and going, and going.  For your sake, I’ll stop here, and leave you with a quote from Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning, a book that was instrumental to me as I came off of psychotropic drugs.  It sums up everything I’ve said here, in one beautiful sentence.

Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.

Indeed, we’re all in this together, and in the midst of the often tremendous suffering lies freedom.

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Mom I Didn’t Mean To Do It

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on February 23, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. 4 Comments

Reposted from Rx Blog.

Mom I Didn’t Mean To Do It

Note from Le Clown: This blog post is written by a friend of mine, Elaine Billings. Elaine is not a blogger, but a mother who lost her son through a tragic death. Her son’s story is an important one, and I am honoured to give her family a place to share this unfortunate story. Elaine will answer your comments herself. Much love, Elaine. 

SSRI Drugs; Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor.
Names for some of these drugs are; Zoloft, Wellbutrin, Celexa, Effexor, Lexapor, Paxil and Prozac.

Tommy’s Story:
My son, Tommy didn’t just pass away ( that sounds so peaceful) it was anything but peaceful. My son committed SUICIDE that day! Why? Because he was given an antidepressant by the name of ZOLOFT! His mental disorder proclaimed by this doctor was, “ANXIETY”! I would certainly like to know, when did ANXIETY become a death sentence????

Tommy - Highshool Graduation
September 8, 2011 Thursday morning, I looked out my dinning room window, and watched my son mowing his lawn. I was smiling and thinking how lucky I was. Tommy and his family had moved back to our home town and as luck would have it, a house across the street went on the market and he bought it. I was just smiling away, and I said to myself, call Tommy up later and see if they want to come over for dinner tomorrow night. By now, you realize I didn’t get a chance to make that phone call!

As told to me by his wife Tina, Tommy woke up that morning rested, and in a happy frame of mind. He made a couple of phone calls to friends. One to meet the next day for lunch, and the other for lunch the following Monday. These conversations show intent to being alive and well. That morning Tina left, to go out with her mother, and Tommy stayed home with his 11 year old daughter and his 9 year old son. At some point that morning, Brett asked his dad if he would go pick up a friend for him to play with Tommy said yes, and went and got him. Later that day, Morgan asked the same, would he go pick up her friend and Tommy said yes. I also, learned on his way down the road, one of Tommy’s friends was driving up the road, and he told Tina, that Tommy did what he always did when passing a friend in their cars. He blinked his car’s head lights and gave a wave and smile.

After that point something sudden, and terrible happened to Tommy’s mind. Instead of getting his daughter’s friend, he drove his car to a downtown parking lot. He parked his car, retrieved his gun from his car’s trunk. He got back into the driver’s seat and putting the gun to his head, he pulled the trigger!! My first born child, my only son, was DEAD! For the life of me, I couldn’t understand how such a happy man who LOVED life, his family, job and friends could do something like this to himself.

A few nights after his death, I was sitting in my bedroom, and he came to me he said, “Mom help me!” “I didn’t mean to do this!” I called my daughter in-law the next day and asked her if Tommy was taking any medications? She said, yes, Zoloft and Wellbutrin. That is when, I started to investigate to see if these antidepressant drugs, could have been the cause of my son’s death. What I learned was staggering and frightening.

The Black Box Warnings

Tommy -  State Police Academy Graduation

In Zoloft the following symptoms have been reported. 1. Anxiety 2.Agitation 3. Panic Attacks 4. Insomnia 5. Irritability 6. Hostility 7. Aggressiveness 8. Impulsivity 9. Akathisia 10. Hypomania and 11. Mania, in adults and pediatric patients. Although a casual link between the emergence of such symptoms has not been established there is concern that such symptoms maybe precursors to emerging of “SUICIDALITY” The Black Box Warning goes on to say, short-term placebo-controlled trials of antidepressant drugs increase the risk of suicidal thinking and behavior in children, adolescents, and young adults, 24/25 years old and younger. My son, was 42 years old.

When he restarted these drugs, in less than two weeks, he was DEAD. He is not the only adult who had died by SUICIDE on these and all Psychotropic drugs. The Pharmaceutical Companies and Scientific evidence suggests that depression and certain anxiety disorders may be caused by a “Chemical Imbalance” in the brain. Yet, there is no blood test, x-ray, MRI that can show this to be true. Psychiatrist can’t predict what adverse side effects you might experience because not one of them knows how their drugs work.

Another paper I have read said, Common and well-documented side effects of psychiatric drugs include; 1. Psychosis 2. Hallucinations 3. Depersonalization 4. Suicidal Ideation 5. Heart Attacks 6. Stroke and sudden death. There are many damaging effects on humans, besides what I have listed here. A very serious problem is withdrawal symptoms, this needs to be done with a doctor who is very familiar with the debilitating side effects of withdrawal. Many people are physically damaged, and will have a lifetime of pain.

If you are asking yourself, why isn’t this information getting out to the general population? May I suggest that the Pharmaceutical Company’s have deep pockets. They advertise their drugs on the major TV networks, also in magazines, newspapers and other print forms. If they get sued, they more than likely settle out of court with some sort of gag order’s in place. GP’s are writing the prescriptions, and many rely, on what the drug reps. are telling them about the SSRI Drugs and all the other Psychotropic Drugs on the market. Drug reps. get paid and bonus’s made by, the amounts of their particular Psych Drugs that are getting filled for the paying customer, us!

Tommy and Mom, at his wedding
My advice is heed; “THE BLACK BOX WARNINGS!” Ask for full disclosure, go home and research the drug before you take it. There are plenty of Professional people out here, who absolutely know the dangers of Psych Drugs and you can friend them on the Internet. Please do, because I know what the SSRI Drugs did to my son first and foremost, and also to our entire family. And me Tommy’s mom, I am never going to be the woman I was before my son’s SUICIDE! I will have a lifetime of grief, because he shouldn’t have died, but because of Big Pharma’s greed! One more warning from me, Stop Drugging Our Children! Putting them into a system, that will do nothing but harm them in the long run!!

_______________________________

Ilion, New York–Thomas E. “Tom” Fort Jr. age 42, passed away, on Thursday afternoon, on September 8, 2011, in Ilion, NY. He was born on January 25, 1969, in Ilion, son of Thomas E. Fort Sr., of Ilion, and Elaine P. (Baker) Billings, of Ilion. He graduated from Utica College with a degree in Criminal Justice. On September 23, 1995, he was joined in marriage with Tina M. Failing in Annunciation Church, Ilion; a union of nearly 16 years. He entered into service with the New York State Police on October 12, 1992, and earned the rank of Investigator on February 4, 1999, and eventually the rank of Sgt. on May 3, 2007. During his 18 year tenure with the state police, he was a hostage negotiator, crime scene technician and a polygraphist.
Tom was successful in the personal roles of his life and devoted to his family which earned him the admiration and respect of his wife and children. He served as an excellent and inspiring role model while performing his duties as a New York State Trooper and eventually as a Sgt. and Investigator. He loved sports, golfing and especially coaching his children’s sports teams. Tom will be forever remembered by his family and friends.
Survivors include his beloved family; his wife, Tina (Failing) Fort, of Ilion; a daughter, Morgan Fort; a son, Brett Fort; his mother and step-father Elaine and William Billings, of Ilion; his father, Thomas Fort, Sr., of Ilion; mother- in-law, Donna Bailey, of Little Falls; father-in-law, Marty Failing, of Little Falls; grandmother, Eleanor Kuhner, of Ilion; sisters and brother-in-laws, Nicole and Gary Stuart, of Scotia, and Kelly and Sam Dickenson, of Glens Falls; brother-in-law and companion, Paut Failing and Adrian DePetro, of Little Falls, step-brother and sister-in-law, Steve and Amy Billings, of Dolgeville; numerous aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews and cousins; as well as many great friends. He was preceded in death by his maternal grandfather, Frank Baker; paternal grandparents, Leland and Betty Fort; and by an uncle, Robert Fort.
Relatives and friends are invited to visitation on Tuesday September 13, 2011, from 4-8 pm. The funeral will commence on Wednesday, September 14, 2011, Procession will follow to Armory Hill Cemetery, Ilion, where he will be laid to rest.

Elaine Billings
Tommy’s mom….. RIP until I see you again my son

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Psychiatric Medication or Play Therapy?

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on February 22, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. Leave a comment
DSCF0115_2
 From:  Fiddaman Blog:  Seroxat Sufferers – Stand Up and Be Counted
PlayTherapy

Psychiatric Medication or Play Therapy? For me it’s a no-brainer but for millions of unsuspecting parents play therapy is just not an option. Why?

Play therapy has, over the years, steadily grown in popularity among clinicians. It has, however, not been accepted by the scientific community and, more often than not, has been criticized for a lack of evidence showing efficacy to support it’s use on a bigger scale. Consequently, its not been offered to parents as an alternative to drugging their children into submission.

So, what is play therapy?

It’s roots go back a long way. We’ve all experienced it at some point in our lives, it’s just being a kid. Exploring the world, expressing yourself and interacting with other kids and adults while having fun.

Think about it for a second. What was the one thing we all craved as children at school? Double history, double maths, geography? – We all wanted to hear that bell – PLAY TIME!

Famous philosopher, Plato, once had this to say about play, “you can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.”.

In the eighteenth century Genevan philosopher, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, wrote in his novel, Émile: or, On Education, how important it was to observe play as a vehicle to learn about and understand children.

Most notably it was Friedrich Fröbel, a German teacher, who laid the foundation for modern education based on the recognition that children have unique needs and capabilities who summed up the value of play by saying “Play is the highest level of child development . . . It gives . . . joy, freedom, contentment, inner and outer rest, peace with the world . . . The plays of childhood are the germinal leaves of all later life.”

So, in Plato, Rousseau and Fröbel, we have a pretty clear understanding of how play therapy is an important tool in understanding children and their needs. All three are regularly quoted in today’s world. Sadly their work and thoughts on how we should all treat children have been eclipsed by the heavy marketing of child disorders and psychiatric medication.

I’d like to step forward in time and offer you three key opinion leaders in the field of mental health, Moreover, I’d like to quote them.

First off, Emeritus Professor John Werry, a child psychiatrist  “as far as we know” giving SSRIs to babies would not harm them. “But one doesn’t like to give growing and developing kids medications that affect basic bio-cyclic processes because it just doesn’t seem like a good idea unless the kid is really in severe difficulty.” He adds, it would be rare to prescribe antidepressants before the teenage years, and that the youngest child he had prescribed one to was a boy with autism aged 8 or 9, but that was “very exceptional”.[1]

“…the ministry had no concerns about the number of children being prescribed medication for ADHD” – Dr Pat Tuohy, Chief Advisor – Child and Youth Health at Ministry of Health New Zealand [2]

Speaking on why children should be given antidepressants, Andrew Cotgrove, Clinical Director and Consultant in Adolescent Psychiatry at Pine Lodge Young People’s Centre, Chester England, said, “We should not deny depressed children one of the few evidence-based available treatments”  [3]

Compare the quotes of Plato, Rousseau and Fröbel with Werry, Tuohy and Cotgrove. What can you see?

Is it just me or do the latter three appear less compelling and enduring than the former?

So, this post is about psychiatric medication vs play therapy. It’s about giving an option to parents who think that medication is the only possible treatment for children with behavioural problems and/or depressive signs. It’s also a post that may interest counsellors, teachers and others who often refer children to mental health services.

In 2005, The Efficacy of Play Therapy With Children: A Meta-Analytic Review of Treatment Outcomes, was published in the Professional Psychology: Research and Practice [4]

The authors used a combination of online and offline search procedures to exhaust all resources in locating both unpublished and published play therapy outcome studies. The University of North Texas was a primary offline resource, particularly for unpublished studies.

Across the 93 studies, a total of 3,248 boys and girls with diverse presenting issues participated in a play therapy intervention. The 93 studies occurred between 1953–2000.

What the authors found after analyzing the 93 studies was that “play therapy outcome studies support the efficacy of this intervention with children suffering from various emotional and behavioral difficulties.”

The meta-analysis concluded the following, “This meta-analysis has significant implications for those who provide mental health services to children and families. These findings should be used to not only educate managed care companies but also to educate and work with parents, government, schools, and the medical and legal communities to provide children with the most beneficial treatments.”

So, given that there is an effective non-medical treatment out there for children with diverse presenting issues, or ADHD, as psychiatry would label it, why do we constantly hear stories about children being hooked on Ritalin, killing themselves on Prozac, Zoloft, Celexa and Paxil, gaining weight on Seroquel?

It would be easy for me to suggest that it was just about the money and the way pharmaceutical companies promote their wares. It was also be way too easy for me to suggest that published papers by key opinion leaders [paid by pharmaceutical companies] influence the majority of prescribing healthcare professionals.

But perhaps there are hidden dangers with Play Therapy not reported in the literature, that stop it being the intervention of choice for medical and mental health professionals?

With this in mind I decided to contact Carol Laubscher of Integrated Learning Therapy, a New Zealand based play therapy centre. I asked her:

1. What effect does play therapy have on a child’s developing brain?

2. Has any child under your care ever become addicted to play therapy?

3. Has any child during the course of receiving play therapy from you ever attempted to self-harm?

4. Has any child during the course of receiving play therapy from you ever attempted suicide?

5. Has any child during the course of receiving play therapy from you ever gained weight as a result of the therapy?

On the issue of play therapy and how it effects a child’s developing brain Carol told me:

“As play therapy works to reconfigure a child’s attachment model, it has a huge effect neurologically, releasing the brain from anxiety and reorganising neural pathways.”

Carol answered ‘no’ to questions 2 – 5.

I also contacted Dr Sue Bratton, co-author of The Efficacy of Play Therapy With Children: A Meta-Analytic Review of Treatment Outcomes, and asked if any adverse events were reported in the 93 studies that were analyzed. Dr Bratton told me that there were no adverse events reported. On the issue of how child therapy effects a child’s brain she told me:

“In all children, play is essential to healthy brain development (If you want details about the neuroscience of play and brain development, I can give you many good resources: Bruce Perry, MD, PhD and Stuart Brown, MD are two examples).  For children who have had early adverse and traumatic experience, the brain’s development is impacted in such a way that the child’s holistic development is thwarted. Play, in the context of relationship, is crucial to the child’s brain developing new neural pathways that promote healthy brain functioning (again, this is a very simplistic explanation, please see Perry or Bonnie Badenoch’s Brainwise Therapist (2008).”

Dr. Bratton is a professor in Counseling and Director of the Center for Play Therapy at the University of North Texas

Using play therapy in children before medication is even considered should, one would think, be top of any healthcare professional’s list. Alas, the odds are stacked against children in favour of psychiatric medication. This is due to a number of factors.

Pharmaceutical companies spend billions on marketing psychiatric medication. If a specific drug is not deemed by the regulatory authorities to be safe or effective for children, pharma will then hire child psychiatrists to run clinical trials, this, to show the regulators, other healthcare professionals and media that these drugs aren’t dangerous in this target population.Front groups that purport to fly the mental health flag are, in fact, nothing more than agents, pimps for the pharmaceutical industry. Examples of these front groups can be seen in the the four articles I highlighted back in 2007 entitled, ‘GlaxoSmithKline, Money Trail Down Under‘. [5], [6], [7], [8]Psychiatrists that are well respected among their peers are also targeted by the pharmaceutical industry, often paid huge sums of money to promote the use of antidepressants in children and adolescents.A and B list celebrities must also carry the shoulder of blame. Quite often they are used as advocates for antidepressant type medications, be they famous sports personalities, Hollywood film stars or TV and radio talk show hosts. These people have huge fan bases, many of their fans hang on to every word they say. In many instances they promote psychiatric medication with financial support from the pharmaceutical industry.Play therapists are individual practitioners. Neither they, nor their professional associations have multi-million dollar marketing arms which are able to buy doctors, celebrities or journalists to promote their product. Nor are they able to create or take-over patient advocacy groups with the sole purpose of promoting their work and building revenues.

The God factor also comes into play. If you, as a parent, do your own research on the drug your child has been prescribed and you bring your concerns to the prescribing doctor’s table you will, more often than not, be dismissed as either not knowing what you are talking about or be accused of reading too many internet conspiracies.

The Play Therapists I have encountered are convinced of the benefits and importance of the work they do but not of their own omnipotence as so many psychiatrists are and are unlikely to promote themselves in quite the way psychiatrists such as Dr Beiderman do in the following famous testimony on his qualifications in a case against pharmaceutical company  Johnson & Johnson.

In a deposition between Dr. Biederman and lawyers for the states, he was asked what rank he held at Harvard. “Full professor,” he answered.

“What’s after that?” asked a lawyer, Fletch Trammell.

“God,” Dr. Biederman responded.

“Did you say God?” Mr. Trammell asked.

“Yeah,” Dr. Biederman said.

Hard to believe huh?

When the competition has that much clout it’s hardly surprising that play therapy, despite its proven efficacy, is rarely used by healthcare professionals.

Then there is cost and convenience. It’s so much cheaper and easier for a parent to choose psychiatric medication for their child than it is to enroll them in play therapy sessions. Global governments subsidize prescription medication, this makes taking drugs even cheaper. They do not subsidise Play Therapy which makes it both relatively expensive and unavailable.

If your child is distressed, disruptive, anti-social and unhappy, as a parent you need a short term solution but also to weigh the long term risks and benefits of the available interventions.

The following chart shows the relative risk of stimulant medication such as ritalin and play therapy on longer term outcomes for kids.

chart

Every day parents are taking that risk when they dispense their prescription at the pharmacy on behalf of their children.

If a kid is being a kid then let them continue to be a kid. Psychiatric medication as first-line treatment is absurd when the option of play therapy exists.

If further evidence were needed regarding the importance of play then The Importance of Play in Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent-Child Bonds [10] published in the Official Journal of Pediatrics, clearly sends out a stark message, a message that is somewhat contradicted.

“Play is a cherished part of childhood that offers children important developmental benefits and parents the opportunity to fully engage with their children. However, multiple forces are interacting to effectively reduce many children’s ability to reap the benefits of play. As we strive to create the optimal developmental milieu for children, it remains imperative that play be included along with academic and social-enrichment opportunities and that safe environments be made available to all children. Additional research is needed to explore the appropriate balance of play, academic enrichment, and organized activities for children with different temperaments and social, emotional, intellectual, and environmental needs.”

All seems good until you delve deeper into the published article…

“Pediatricians should refer to appropriate mental health professionals when children or their parents show signs of excessive stress, anxiety, or depression.”

It’s almost like an add-on, a disclaimer – such is the stranglehold psychiatry has on the modern day. Unless we recognise that Play Therapists are mental health professionals and their therapy addresses stress, anxiety and depression by nurturing rather than damaging children’s growing brains.

When weighing up the benefits of psychiatric medication against the risks, one should always remember that there are many adverse reactions reported, some so severe that children have died because the prescribed medication induced their suicide…you cannot get a more adverse reaction than death.

Brain damage has also been linked to children taking these powerful drugs. In 2009, ‘Differential regulation of psychostimulant-induced gene expression of brain derived neurotrophic factor and the immediate-early gene Arc in the juvenile and adult brain’ was published in European Journal Of Neuroscience. [11] The authors concluded:

“The psycho-stimulant drugs Methylphenidate (Ritalin) and Amphetamine are widely used in children for the treatment of ADHD, but recent data suggest that exposure to these agents in early life could be detrimental to brain development.”

Ritalin is widely used in children with behavioural problems.

In another study, Stimulant Induced Psychosis, published in the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Journal in 2009 [12] the authors concluded that:

“Our findings highlight potential issues in the care of children treated with stimulant medication. Throughout the United Kingdom practices differ; many localities have specialist ADHD clinics, which include Paediatric services or Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services. The practice of shared care with the General Practitioner is amongst NICE recommendations. We feel it is important for all professionals involved in the use of stimulant medication to have mental health training, particularly in the careful screening and identification of psychotic symptoms which could easily be mistaken as a deterioration in the symptoms of ADHD and result in an increase in the dose of stimulant prescribed, potentially having serious implications.”

Play therapy, however, report no adverse reactions.

Still not convinced yet?

Perhaps the following article will sway your opinion. It was published in the Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry journal last year. ‘The Risks Associated With Stimulant Medication Use in Child and Adolescent Populations Diagnosed With Attention- Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder’ [13] was written by Jeanne M. Stolzer, PhD of the University of Nebraska-Kearney.

In her summation Stolzer writes:

“ADHD-type behaviors are nothing new. They have been documented across cultures, across time, and across mammalian species (Stolzer, 2005). The fact of the matter is that children have always been fidgety, highly active, inattentive, spontaneous, and prone to engage in behaviors that exacerbate adults. What has been compendiously altered is our collective perception of what constitutes normal-range child behaviors. The simple and reductionistic medical model refuses to acknowledge bioevolutionary based traits, financial incentives to label children with ADHD, inappropriate educational systems, the influence of the pharmaceutical industry, nature deprivation, and alterations in cultural perceptions of childhood. The medical model remains adamant that ADHD behaviors are pathological and can be attributed to a chemical imbalance within the child’s brain in spite of the fact that no empirical evidence exists to substantiate this hypothesis. We have two choices. We can cling to a hypothesis which has no scientific credence, and continue to prescribe dangerous and addictive stimulant medication to millions of children who have been diagnosed with a mythical disease—or we can demand an end to this lunacy.”

If, after reading all of the above evidence, you still think medicating children and adolescents is safe and effective then you’ll just add to my despair – I can deal with that via some adult play… normally my guitar.

As I said in the beginning of this post, “For me it’s a no-brainer.”


There are no seven wonders of the world in the eyes of a child. There are seven million.
~ Walt Streightiff

Bob Fiddaman

[1] Babies Given Antidepressants In New Zealand [Link]
[2] NZ urged to shift stress on drugs as first option [Link]
[3] To Give Or Not To Give Antidepressants To Young People [Link]
[4] The Efficacy of Play Therapy With Children: A Meta-Analytic Review of Treatment Outcomes – Sue C. Bratton, Dee Ray, Tammy Rhine, Leslie Jones – Professional Psychology: Research and Practice – 2005, Vol. 36, No. 4, 376–390
[5] GlaxoSmithKline Money Trail Down Under Part 1 [Link]
[6] GlaxoSmithKline Money Trail Down Under Part 2 [Link]
[7] GlaxoSmithKline Money Trail Down Under Part 3 [Link]
[8] GlaxoSmithKline Money Trail Down Under Part 4 – Enter Dr Martin Keller [Link]
[9] Knowles v. Minister for Defence [2002] IEHC 39 (22 February 2002)
[10] PEDIATRICS Vol. 119 No. 1 January 1, 2007 pp. 182 -191 (doi: 10.1542/peds.2006-2697)
[11] Differential regulation of psychostimulant-induced gene expression of brain derived neurotrophic factor and the immediate-early gene Arc in the juvenile and adult brain – European Journal Of Neuroscience [serial online]. February 2009;29(3):465-476.
[12] Stimulant Induced Psychosis – Child and Adolescent Mental Health Volume 14, No. 1, 2009, pp. 20–23
[13] The Risks Associated With Stimulant Medication Use in Child and Adolescent Populations Diagnosed With Attention- Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder – Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry, Volume 14, Number 1, 2012

CHART REFERENCES

[1] Shatha Shibib & Nevyne Chalhoub Stimulant Induced Psychosis Child and Adolescent Mental Health Volume 14, No. 1, 2009, pp. 20–23
[2] Banerjee P. Differential regulation of psychostimulant-induced gene expression of brain derived neurotrophic factor and the immediate-early gene Arc in the juvenile and adult brain. European Journal Of Neuroscience [serial online]. February 2009;29(3):465-476.
[3] Lambert N. The Contribution of Childhood ADHD, Conduct Problems, and Stimulant Treatment to Adolescent and Adult Tobacco and Psychoactive Substance Abuse. Ethical Human Psychology & Psychiatry [serial online]. Winter2005 2005;7(3):197-221.
[4] Jeanne, M. S. (2012). The risks associated with stimulant medication use in child and adolescent populations diagnosed with attention- Deficit/Hyperactivity disorder. Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry, 14(1), 5-14.
[5] Samuels, Franco, Wan, & Sorof, 2006
[6] Gould, M., Walsh, B., Munfakh, J., Kleinman, M., Duan, N., Olfson, M., et al. (2009). Sudden death and the use of stimulant medications in youth. American Journal of Psychiatry, 166(9), 992-1001
[7] Stein, M. (2009). Psychiatric reactions to ADHD medications. Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, 123, 111–120.

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HEY TEACHERS! LEAVE THEM KIDS ALONE!

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on February 8, 2013
Posted in: Uncategorized. Tagged: add, Adderal, adderall, adhd, adhd medication, Australia, Concerta, fidgeting, First aid, learning disorders, mental health, mental health first aid, Metadate, metal health commission of canada, New Zealand, Parenting, parents, personality disorder, Provigil, psychiatric drugs, ritalin, safe schools, school children, Scotland, teachers, United States, Vyvanse. 10 Comments

Remember when you were young and those first ‘back to school’ days?    You put on your new socks and underwear, new shoes all  clean and perfect?  And for the girls, the skirt your mother let you pick out and a blouse to go with it?  The boredom in the freedom of summer holidays had eventually set in (as it always did)  and now the excitement of meeting your new classmates,  hoping against all hope that your best friend was in your class.  The sinking feeling you got when you thought you might get Mr. or Mrs. ????? for a teacher?!’  I recall it with fondness and a deep sense of nostalgia.

If school was anything,  it was safe and I loved it.  Teachers had their programs and their personalities and their methods.  Some were great,  some were not, but the funny ones were the best.  Every class had at least one clown, always fooling around and getting into trouble and in looking back, every class had kids who couldn’t quite grasp what was being taught, who fidgeted and upset the scheme of things.  Every class had a kid who’s parents were somewhat lacking in the ‘how to raise a child’ category and so they were usually unruly and troublesome to the teacher.  Or the kids who would do anything for attention…  Back then, they were put in the corner or sent to the principal’s office or scolded or, when the teacher was pushed beyond their breaking point, the strap.

images-2Not so today.  School is not safe for children anymore.  Sad statement, but  true.  Ask a teacher – any teacher, how many kids in their class are on ‘medication’ for some sort of learning or personality disorder.  Drugs such as Ritalin, Concerta, Adderal, Metadate, Vyvanse, Provigil.  Drugs that even the  U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration classifies  as Schedule ll, in the same class of highly addictive drugs as morphine, opium and cocaine – these are ADHD medications.  Teachers are now being taught how to recognize ‘mental illness’ in children or, even scarier ‘early warning signs’ of mental illness.  Now I am not in any way in favor of the old ways, of corporal punishment, but to label a child, stigmatize him and then put that child on drugs is just beyond comprehension.

There is now a (not so) new program, put out by the Mental Health Commission of Canada, exported from Australia called Mental Health First Aid.  What is Mental Health First Aid?  Per their (Canadian) website their purpose is “to share the same overall purpose as traditional first aid – to save lives”.  Mental ‘CPR’ so to speak.

Mental Health First Aid has been (or is in the process of being) implemented in England, Australia, United States, Wales, Scotland, New Zealand, Sweden, on and on ad nauseam…..  And what effect can this have on our children’s lives?

The MHFA Canada for Adults who Interact with Youth Course  is designed to enable teachers to  recognize a ‘mental illness’ or the ‘warning signs’ of mental illness in children in, among other places, the classroom.

Their long-term vision for Mental Health First Aid is:

‘In the next ten years, we hope that Mental Health First Aid will become as common as CPR and First Aid training. Mental Health First Aid has the potential to reduce stigma, improve mental health literacy, and empower individuals.’

And what might this mean to those kids all of us remember being in the classroom with?  The unruly ones, the fidgeters, the sad ones, the attention grabbers.  It means that they don’t stand a chance.  It means they will be evaluated, sent to a doctor and prescribed some sort of medication – that their lives will become a drug induced haze.  But you can bet your bottom dollar that they’ll ‘snap to it’.  Their malleability becomes a certainty.  But what of the child?

If a teacher, doctor, counselor or anyone says your child has a ‘mental disorder’ and needs to be on ‘medication’, ask for a lab test or a blood test or x-ray – ANYTHING to substantiate this claim.  They won’t be able to do it because this test does not exist.   Your child will have been diagnosed most likely from a ‘checklist’ of symptoms OR from a teacher who’s taken a 6 hour course via Mental Health First Aid Canada who, having bought the bulls*#t is now ‘totally devoted to Promoting mental health and wellness for youth in Canada’ and the United States…and England…and Sweden….New Zealand….

**NOTE:  I know there are a lot of caring, loving and supportive teachers and school administrators out there who don’t agree with what’s going on.  This is not intended for you, but acquiescence will not change things.  Please speak up.

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Wake Up Call for Federal Investigation of America’s Failed Mental Health System

Posted by lorifarquharbryenton on December 19, 2012
Posted in: Uncategorized. Tagged: health, mental health, research. 6 Comments

Written by Kelly Patricia O’Meara – December 18, 2012

O’Meara was the first investigative journalist to expose the link between school shootings and psychiatric drugs in her 1999 cover story, Guns & Doses.

shootersdrugs-300x200

Sign the Petition:  Launch a federal investigation in to the relationship between school shootings and psychiatric drugs.

In the coming days, as a nation, we will respectfully bow our heads for those brief moments of silence in remembrance of the victims of Newtown, Ct. Then, with the same outrage expressed at the murderous act, the nation must rise up and demand a sweeping investigation behind all the possible causes, including the mental health system itself.

According to news reports, the Sandy Hook shooter, Adam Lanza, was a product of the mental health system and had been taking “medication” since the age of ten and reportedly seeing a psychiatrist from at least the age of 15. Lanza’s mother reportedly told friends that Lanza “was getting worse” and “she was having trouble reaching him.” The questions that need to be answered is when did Adam Lanza first receive mental health treatment, what diagnoses did he receive and what drugs had he been prescribed over his short life.

The larger question is how many times does this senseless scenario have to play out before lawmakers finally acknowledge that the supporting data already exist and, to date, has repeatedly and deliberately been ignored. Between 1998 and 2012, fourteen school shootings occurred, taking the lives of 58 and wounding 109. All fourteen of those shooters were taking or withdrawing from a psychiatric drug and seven of them had been under the “care” of a psychiatrist or psychologist.

In other mass shootings, such as James Holmes, the suspected perpetrator of the July 20, 2012 mass shooting at a movie theatre in Aurora, Colorado, it is known that Holmes was seeing psychiatrist Lynne Fenton, yet no mention has been made of what psychiatric drugs he had been prescribed.

The majority of these shooters had been prescribed psychiatric mind-altering drugs that had not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration, FDA, for treatment of children under the age of 18. Yet, antidepressants are at the top of the list of drugs indicted in these shootings, including Prozac, Trazodone, Effexor, Celexa and Luvox, to name a few.

schoolshooters-300x200 And, a recent study reviewing the FDA’s adverse drug event data reveals that “the data provide new evidence that acts of violence towards others are a genuine and serious adverse drug event that is associated with a relatively small group of drugs. Varenicline, which increases the availability of dopamine, and serotonin reuptake inhibitors were the most strongly and consistently implicated drugs.” In other words, antidepressants are the consistently implicated drugs.

There is no question that psychiatric drugs cause violence as 22 internationa l drug regulatory warnings have been issued on psychiatric drugs citing effects such as mania, hostility, violence and even homicidal ideation.  Dozens of high profile shootings/killings have been tied to psychiatric drug use, yet there has been no federal investigation into the link between psychiatric drugs and acts of senseless violence.

Each of these psychiatric drug “treatments” carry the FDA’s Black-box warning, the federal agency’s most serious warning, which reads in part: “Antidepressants increased the risk of suicidal thinking and behavior (suicidality) in short-term studies in children and adolescents with Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) and other psychiatric disorders.”  Despite the FDA’s warning, these psychiatric drugs are prescribed to children between the ages of 12-17 at a rate of one in 25.

But the data gets much worse, and certainly it is information that is available to those who are in a position to effect the change that is way past necessary. For example, 11 percent of the U.S. population over the age of 12 is taking at least one antidepressant, nine out of ten children who visit a child psychiatrist leave with a prescription for a mind-altering drug and, even more outrageous, 1 in 70 preschoolers are taking a psychiatric drug. These are the same drugs name in the above study.

And these data only deal with the ever-increasing drugging of the nation’s children.  It is a sad but true fact that while the U.S. comprises only five percent of the world’s population, it consumes two-thirds of the world’s use of psychiatric drugs.  The reason behind these insane numbers can be directly linked to the increased diagnosing of mental illness.

schoolshooters1 The truth is, without the diagnosis these psychiatric drugs cannot be prescribed. Even the muckety-mucks of psychiatry understand the detrimental power of the mental illness diagnoses. Dr. Allen J. Frances, a former chairman of the American Psychiatric Association’s DSM-IV-R Task Force revealed in a recent op-ed that “new diagnoses in psychiatry are more dangerous than new drugs because they influence whether or not millions of people are placed on drugs….”

Today, the numbers of American’s being diagnosed as mentally ill is skyrocketing. Each year $100 billion is spent on mental health in the U.S. and in 2006, alone, psychiatric disorders cost 200 percent more than general medical care. And, the pharmaceutical industry isn’t shy about cashing in on the diagnosing, racking up $150 billion dollars in sales of mind-altering psychiatric drugs in 2009 – half of all prescription sales in the U.S.

There is no shortage of data to support the connection between psychiatric drugs and violence. What is missing is a serious discussion about the effect the mental health industry is having on the national well-being. More than a decade ago, a few insightful lawmakers in New York understood the growing problem and introduced what can only be described as groundbreaking legislation.

New York Senate Bill 1784, introduced in 2001 by then Senator Owen H. Johnson, would require law enforcement agencies in New York to collect data on certain violent crimes and what, if any, psychiatric drugs the offender may have been on during the commission of the crime.

The bill’s authors had done their homework and based the need for the legislation on research “which has been published in peer reviewed publications such as the American Journal of Psychiatry, the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and the Journal of Forensic Science, has shown, among other things that: certain drugs can induce mania, some patients on psychotropic drugs have an increase in suicidal thoughts and/or violent behavior, self-injurious ideation or behavior is intensified, users of certain drugs can become aggressive or suffer hallucinations and/or suicidal thoughts and certain drugs can produce an acute psychotic reaction.”

Although this bill did not make it out of committee, no part of the information provided in it, or the call for swift action, has changed. If anything, these legislators were ahead of their time. But with more than a decade of increasing violent acts associated with psychiatric drugs, there is no better time to take action.

Short of a serious investigation into the ever-increasing diagnosing of mental illness and the connection between psychiatric drugs and violence, the nation will continue to relive the tragic events of Newtown…Aurora, Co, Columbine, Co, and dozens more over the past decade, and those who are in the position to effect change and fail to do so should hang their head in shame.

Kelly Patricia O’Meara is an award winning investigative reporter for the Washington Times, Insight Magazine, penning dozens of articles exposing the fraud of psychiatric diagnosis and the dangers of the psychiatric drugs – including her ground-breaking 1999 cover story, Guns & Doses, exposing the link between psychiatric drugs and acts of senseless violence.  She is also the author of the highly acclaimed book, Psyched Out: How Psychiatry Sells Mental Illness and Pushes Pills that Kill.  Prior to working as an investigative journalist, O’Meara spent sixteen years on Capitol Hill as a congressional staffer to four Members of Congress. She holds a B.S. in Political Science from the University of Maryland.

 

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